Craigslist Scams

I have been selling a lot more on Craigslist lately or at least been listing a lot more on CL.  I have run into a couple of scams and one scary situation.

My question is what scams are out there?  I know not to accept any PayPal payments to ship of course but what about Trojan ads.  Are they just phishing for email addresses and phone numbers?  You see a lot of ads of to good to be true and I have yet to get answers from them.  Thanks again

Most of them involve the following:

1. You receiving a payment through PayPal, which will be a fake email or a transaction that won't clear.
2. You receiving a cashiers check or money order which you will deposit and it will never clear.
3. You wiring money for an item you want which will never show up.

All of the transactions involve a shipping company. (Or at least the seller will say he's sending a company to drop off or pick up the item.)

Most of the time the buyer will offer to add extra money for your inconvenience.

If you receive a text, it will almost always include the title & price of your item written exactly the way it was in the ad.

The buyer will always tell you they are out of town/country on business and are unable to come see the item.

and I'm sure I'm forgetting to mention lots of other things.

When you post an ad on cList just check the radio button that says (in effect) don't take email responses.

That will prevent most of the scam attempts you will get.  Just use a phone number. Many ways to do that if you don't want to use your own phone. I use my home phone and have had very few problems over 10 years.

Here's a response I got recently when asking about a car for sale. All I asked was when and where I could see it, and got this back.
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Hi,

The car is in perfect shape, never been smoked in, without scratches nor dents, and it has never been involved in any kind of accidents. I legally own, free of any liens or loans, under my name. It has 94,709 miles, for sale at $1860. I’m selling the car because I lost my husband and my child of only 19 years, with 2 months ago in a car accident. A drunk truck driver hit them. They were in my husband’s car and they didn’t had a chance. This was my child's car and brings me a lot of memories that make me suffer and this is the reason for what I want to sell it as soon as possible. If you have any other questions, or need more info, please free to ask.

Dorothy

Then after asking again where and when I could see the car, I got this.
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As I told you in my first email, I recently lost my son and my husband. Currently I am located in Cincinnati, OH at my parents because they are the only persons that I have in my life at this moment. I'm very busy with my job and I'm left out of the town so I can't meet in person with you so this is the reason why I chose to sell my car over the internet. I'm currently, signed up for a protection program offered by eBay and I would like to close the deal through them. If you are not aware of this program you should know that it will allow you to test drive and inspect the car before paying me. You will have a 5-day inspection period to decide whether you want to keep the car or not before they release the funds to me. eBay is safe. If you agree with eBay's terms and conditions I need the following details from you: full name, address, and phone# and I will initiate the transaction. eBay will contact you shortly after they have the details with all the information that you need to complete this deal. Sorry for the long emails I have tried to touch all bases.

Sincerely,

Dorothy

Most scams I run across are more interested in getting your information rather than getting your cash. If you get a response that says "email me at '[email protected]'". It's a phishing attempt. They'll use that email response to hack into your email and search for bank emails and other personal information.

In regard to phone numbers, this scam can be done the same way with text messages. They use a text response to hack into your phone's email and get these same emails.

After asking for a third time where and when I could see the car I then got this.
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You have to know that I sign a contract with eBay and the car is already crated and insured, at the shipping company. I can't stop the process now. Please understand that you will have the car for a test several days and after that you will decided to buy it or send it back. If you don't want the car you will be fully refunded from my account. Get back to me asap and let me know. I am just waiting your full name and address to complete the shipping papers and start the delivery process.

Thanks,